Oh and if you’re wondering to yourself, “But I know a gazillion other forums allow for photos”, the answer is that you would be correct. What we’re trying to do is help ensure as best we can a positive experience for everyone here. If you were around during the last forums you may remember that it started turing into the wild wild west and we don’t want that to happen again. To be frank the community at large is the key to how many cool things we can implement on the forums and on the website. If you’re on here now it means that you were invited and we’re counting on all of you to really set the tone when it comes to not only helping each other out but also letting us know when you see something that just isn’t welcome. Before I get off my soapbox let me just say that the people on the team such as Andy *really really really* care about the drumming community. We’re chomping at the bit to get new things up and running but for things to really pick up steam we need to feel like the community has taken ownership of the forums and website and tell us/show us, “Hey we got this” so that we can spend our time implementing new things vs. taking care of issues and problem children. Getting off soapbox. Play patriotic closing credit music.

Kudos on taking it slow and easy.
I threw out the pics question as pics might liven things up a bit. Understand the potential server overload with regard to pics. Not to mention site clutter. (A pic of your snare is good. Pics taken from each lug angle are a bit much. Yup, seen it.)

Been over on the Tama forum for a few years. We (the forum members) even managed to survive a period of no moderation. (No moderator present.) I think that all of the members there (well, most) acquitted themselves well. I have seen other forums get too far extended into areas that really do not have much to do with drumming as regards topics. Probably to boost readership. May work there, hope it won’t happen here. (I gotta be careful - my sigs the same on all sites.)

In the 2 cents department: I would caution against too many topics and hence too many sub-topics.

What’s your game plan?

Are there limitations involved in making the Tama crew aware of this new site?

(Yes, I use -and have been called on it many times- too many parantheses)...)))))))

Pic uploads are up and running.
For the sake of keeping things humming the limitations are three posts per post with a 75k limit.
We feel like this is going to be enough but if we are wrong give us a shout.

I try to be a bit timelier with my online responses to drummagazine.com members, but erniek threw a curveball when he asked, “What’s your game plan?” And frankly, I’ve been thinking about his question ever since.

To a great extent, simply launching the Forum was the initial plan in and of itself. But now that it’s live and beginning to percolate, erniek has forced me to go one step further — and I am very grateful for that.

So here goes. We want this forum to be a place where serious discussions about the art of drumming take root and grow. We don’t intend to allow this forum to be a battleground for flame wars, where arbitrary feuds are enacted and trolls find a home base. On the other hand, we will exert extreme caution about editing or deleting posts — so that while we won’t tolerate racism or sexism, we do want our members to feel free to express themselves civilly. In other words, it’s okay for you to say you think a particular drummer is overrated, but it’s not okay to say you hate his or her race, politics, or religious beliefs.

We want members to take the wheel and steer the course, which is why we have been very selective so far by only registering members who have been invited by the drummagazine.com team. Note for everyone else: Don’t worry, and please don’t take it personally. We will lift the velvet rope very soon. But our game plan is to allow a finite number of handpicked members to define the tone of the forum. Once they help to set the direction, we will open registration to all dummagazine.com users.

One last thing. Erkiek also asked, “Are there limitations involved in making the Tama crew aware of this new site?” Nope. None whatsoever.